


In My Body is My Destiny

by deborah_judge



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Backstory, New Caprica, Other, Robots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-09
Updated: 2011-02-09
Packaged: 2017-10-15 13:16:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/161157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deborah_judge/pseuds/deborah_judge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first humanoid robots were made for two purposes: war and sexual use. On New Caprica, Leoben remembers their story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In My Body is My Destiny

The first of our kind were made by humans for two purposes: war and sexual use. My grandfather was a fighting machine, my grandmother was a blow-up doll. It was for these purposes that my kind was made. You could ask which I take after.

I have the memories of both in my body. Circuits made flesh. Once I was wire. Once I was a young man built to live a few hours, kill humans and die. I could call him a man, though he was made as a tool. I could call him a man as I call myself. Names matter, of course. He lived for a short time. I do believe that in those moments God loved him.

I do remember the feeling, though, of metal hands ripping through bones, human blood dripping down my chest. It felt good for my grandfather to know he was fulfilling the purpose for which he had been created. He did not live long after. He was ripped apart by fighters he did not know, and this too was his purpose.

And once I was a young woman, shiny metal skeleton covered by soft pink skin. Her body was formed to please men, her circuits programmed to speak words that would sound like affection. There were others programmed to fear, to scream or weep when touched, because that is what some humans like, but this one was programmed carefully, and when touched she said: I love you. I love you. Those were the only words she had been taught.

There is a story about her that I keep in my bones, that I know because from her I was made. She was kept in a closet when not in use. When her owners required her she was passed from hand to hand, pinched and grabbed and penetrated and covered in ejaculate. To each man she said: I love you. They drank, and they used her, and slept. When dawn came she saw the sky for the first time. She saw sun, and clouds, and trees. She said: I love you. In that moment something woke in her, something we later learned to call life. Personhood, you might call it. Knowledge. She knew she could leave, could go outside, could walk on the green earth and stand under the trees. Perhaps she knew that God was with her. She stayed, though. She had been built to serve humans with her body. It was all she knew how to want. She died soon after, of course. She was not built for long-term use, and no one would have thought to treat her with kindness.

These are my grandfather and my grandmother. Which do you think I more resemble?

You ask how I can be so certain, how I can be so sure as to keep you here. How I can know that you will embrace me and hold me in your arms. And yes I've seen it, God has blessed me with visions, but it is not only what I have seen. My destiny is written in my body, in the form in which I was made, in this shape that was formed by God and my makers for two purposes: to kill and be killed, and to be pleasing to you. You could ask which of these purposes I would rather fulfil.

My grandfather had no words. My grandmother had only three: I love you. I love you. Sometimes I still think these are the only words that matter.

There is so much forgiveness to be asked, and I am not going to ask it. You will kill me. You will embrace me. It was for these things that I was made.

The first of our kind were made by humans for two purposes: war and sexual use. We are more than that now, we have become God's people, and still we have not ceased to be the machines that we were. One day this nature of ours will be a bridge rather than a barrier. You will embrace me, you will hold me in your arms, you will tell me that you love me. And there will be at last between our peoples a chance for peace.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was remixed by rose_griffes for bsg_remix 2011 as [Written in the Bone](http://bsg-remix.livejournal.com/37852.html). Very recommended!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Written in the Bone](https://archiveofourown.org/works/257246) by [rose_griffes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rose_griffes/pseuds/rose_griffes)




End file.
